A hockey legacy

Sunday evening photoblogging (posted a day late because of the holiday):

This weekend was a splendid Spring day in North Carolina, with warm, dry, sunny days and cool nights. Our flower gardens are tinged with color and promises of a vibrant Summer show.

So, naturally, when searching my photo archives for a photoblogging entry, I gravitated to this image of a cold, Midwestern afternoon during my high school days in DeKalb, Illinois. In this picture, my brothers Nick, Matt, Chris and I pose before we head out onto the NIU pond for a few hours of pickup hockey. Beneath my jacket I’m wearing a hockey jersey my dad made up for me; it’s embroidered with the name The Ramblers, a hockey team my grandfather (Frank the Beachcomber) was on when he was younger — he and his brothers skated on Lake Calumet and other southside Chicago ponds. And that pad on my knee belonged to my father when he played hockey in suburban Chicago.